Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Vintage Trailers Offer Backyard Retreat
PRAIRIE GROVE — A park with vintage travel trailers from the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s will provide a place for visitors to step back in time and relax with friends, family and possibly even strangers.
Flamingo Springs Trailer Resort is a place inspired by a resort in Palm Springs, Calif. Owned by husband and wife team Zack and Laura Kraus, Flamingo Springs is located near Prairie Grove, at 15475 Greasy Valley Road about five miles from U.S. 62.
Zack and Laura moved to Forrest City from Los Angeles about a year ago and began looking for property in that part of the state. Laura grew up in Wynne and wanted to be closer to family.
She was hired to work as a production designer on the movie “Parker’s Anchor” that was being filmed in Fayetteville at the time.
While Laura worked, Zack wandered around Northwest Arkansas.
“I fell in love with the area,” Zack said.
They began looking for property to purchase in Northwest Arkansas, specifically hoping to find something with an old barn.
On the last day, they were shown 60 acres outside Prairie Grove and loved the property and loved Prairie Grove.
They bought the land in May 2016, started construction in June 2016 on their Quonset hut. They moved into their house several months ago in October.
Zack said he stumbled on the idea for a trailer resort. He saw one on the Internet in Palm Springs and stayed in one of the trailers for his birthday. The couple liked the idea and later decided to do their own resort.
“We wanted to create some kind of environment for artists to come
to,” Laura said.
They see their resort as providing a place for an artist retreat, a yoga retreat and a quiet area to meditate, or a craft retreat. It also could be a place for family reunions, get-togethers or a place for a couple to get away.
A brochure on the resort describes the park as a “backyard retreat for locals, an oasis for road-weary travelers, and an eclectic space for your next event.”
Zack said the resort will be “out of the hustle and bustle of everyday life.”
The travel trailers will be permanently parked in a semi-circle surrounding a pool, hot tub and fire pit. They can be rented by the night or longer, similar to hotel rooms. From their front doors, guests will have views that include mountains, woods and farm pastures.
The plan is to have about 10 trailers that have been completely renovated and decorated according to different themes. Some of the trailers are small, only sleeping two-three people, and others will sleep up to six people.
Laura said they do not want the park to be very big so it will retain the intimacy of a small resort.
Themes for the trailers include Friends, from the television show; Candy Cane Lane with Christmas decorations; The Horn based on the old, wild west; the Pink Fuzzy Unicorn similar to what a teenage girl in the ’90s would want; and the Gypsy Den, complete with beaded curtains and velvet, overstuffed pillows.
Their trailers are from the 1950s-1970s and Zack said he’s purchased the trailers through Craigslist and from getting leads from people.
“Someone who knows someone who knows someone with a trailer,” Zack said.
The trailers basically are stripped down to the base and then rebuilt. Some of the vintage travel trailers restored include Airstream, Argosy, Spartan, Shasta and Avion.
Laura said they enjoy using their creative sides to design the trailers, restore the insides and then decorate them according to the different themes.
“It’s exciting to us and we hope will be nostalgic on some level to people who come,” Laura said.
One of the features they like about the resort is that it will have “forced interaction” among guests because of the close proximity of the trailers.
“There’s not much privacy and you could have a bunch of strangers coming and sitting together around the fire or around the pool,” Laura said.
Zack added he believes communicating with others is more important than ever with the technology that is taking over people’s lives.
“You come to a place like this and you have to meet everyone.”
Along with the pool area, a section of the Quonset hut will be open to resort guests. This part will have a ping pong table, pool table, an old, working jukebox, a library and board games available for entertainment.
Other activities while at the resort will be hiking, horseshoes, Baggo, and shooting cans on the BB range.
Visitors will bring their own food to the trailer resort but the community room will have an indoor food preparation area, along with cooking utensils.
Outdoor grills also will be open to guests.
The resort will begin taking reservations in August and will have a grand opening party for family and friends later in the month.
To find out more, go to FlamingoSpringsTrailerResort.com or to the resort’s Facebook page.